{"id":8378,"date":"2024-09-19T13:10:43","date_gmt":"2024-09-19T13:10:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kohajone.press\/?p=8378"},"modified":"2024-09-19T13:10:45","modified_gmt":"2024-09-19T13:10:45","slug":"nasa-announces-stranded-astronauts-will-return-to-earth-on-spacex-craft","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kohajone.press\/?p=8378","title":{"rendered":"NASA Announces Stranded Astronauts Will Return To Earth On SpaceX Craft"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/conservativebrief.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/Musk.jpg.webp\" alt=\"\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">&nbsp;Getty Images<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">NASA announced Saturday that it would use Elon Musk\u2019s SpaceX to bring home two astronauts who had been stuck on the International Space Station since early June because their Boeing Starliner spaceship had several problems during the flight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams will not be taking the Boeing spacecraft back to Earth. Instead, they will take a SpaceX Crew Dragon ship. The choice was made after months of public worry, speculation about the astronauts\u2019 well-being, and disagreements between government agencies about the return mission. The first trip was only supposed to last eight days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cSpaceflight is risky \u2014 even at its safest and even at its most routine \u2014 and a test flight, by nature, is neither safe nor routine, and so the decision to keep Butch and Suni aboard the International Space Station and bring the Boeing Starliner home uncrewed is a result of a commitment to safety,\u201d NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said Saturday at a news briefing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe pair originally lifted off from Florida\u2019s Space Coast in early June but while in orbit and docked to the ISS, engineers discovered helium leaks and issues involving thrusters, which prompted NASA and Boeing to investigate. The investigation included ground tests at the Army\u2019s White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico to recreate the problems, which both NASA and Boeing characterized as minor,\u201d Yahoo&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.yahoo.com\/news\/stranded-astronauts-wont-come-home-171651674.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">noted<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">NASA management said they would use the spaceship in an emergency. However, research done in the weeks since has made people less sure that the vehicle is a good choice for getting the astronauts back to Earth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">NASA decides Boeing Starliner crew will come home on SpaceX spacecraft &#8211; Houston Chronicle <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/CC7g0zjIMA\">https:\/\/t.co\/CC7g0zjIMA<\/a><\/p>&mdash; XL King (@XLKing45262) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/XLKing45262\/status\/1828046528725839968?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">August 26, 2024<\/a><\/blockquote><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">NASA said that Wilmore and Williams will come back to Earth on a future SpaceX trip because they don\u2019t know enough about the spacecraft.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The people on SpaceX Crew 9 will have to be changed because of these changes to the schedule. The launch from Florida\u2019s Space Coast probably won\u2019t happen until September.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The new plan calls for cutting down on the team of four so that there is room for the two astronauts who are stuck on the ISS and will return in February 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Wilmore and Williams will keep doing tests on the space station until they leave. This is because they are still waiting for more supplies and custom suits for their trip back to Earth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">NASA Commercial Crew Program Manager Steve Stich recently said that he saw a \u201cbright future for Starliner,\u201d even with all the problems. However, it is still unknown if the ship will fly again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission show that the Boeing program has been held up for years and has lost more than a billion dollars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Starliner news comes at a time when the Fortune 500 company was trying to recover from a rough year in which it admitted that its 737 MAX had design flaws, a door plug flew off an airplane in the middle of a flight, top management, including the CEO, was reorganized, and employees told investigators about bad manufacturing practices at some of its facilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">NASA, on the other hand, has kept up its demand for at least two U.S.-based vehicles that can take humans to the ISS, since there has only been one since 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">If the Boeing CST-100 Starliner had been able to take off and land successfully, it would have become the second cleared ship for sending people and supplies to the ISS.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">NASA and Boeing were already working on the first flight after certification. It was supposed to send four astronauts to the ISS in August 2025, but both the date and the mission now seem to be in danger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">NASA officials said it was too early to say how this would affect future Starliner trips because they need to check the spacecraft\u2019s safety first, which could take several months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">There are at least two other private U.S. space companies that want to send crews to the International Space Station, but only Elon Musk\u2019s Dragon spaceship has received NASA approval to do so.<\/p>\n<div class=\"684f6003e199ca137b09540a661b4c2d\" data-index=\"2\" style=\"float: none; margin:0px 0 0px 0; text-align:center;\">\n<!-- Composite Start -->\r\n<div id=\"M940464ScriptRootC1583286\">\r\n<\/div>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/jsc.adskeeper.com\/k\/o\/kohajone.press.1583286.js\" async>\r\n<\/script>\r\n<!-- Composite End -->\r\n\n<\/div>\n\n<div style=\"font-size: 0px; height: 0px; line-height: 0px; margin: 0; padding: 0; clear: both;\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NASA announced Saturday that it would use Elon Musk\u2019s SpaceX to bring home two astronauts who had been stuck on the International Space Station since early June&#8230; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8379,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8378","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kohajone.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8378","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kohajone.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kohajone.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kohajone.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kohajone.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8378"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kohajone.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8378\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8380,"href":"https:\/\/kohajone.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8378\/revisions\/8380"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kohajone.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8379"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kohajone.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8378"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kohajone.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8378"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kohajone.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8378"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}